The "Middle East and Terrorism" Blog was created in order to supply information about the implication of Arab countries and Iran in terrorism all over the world. Most of the articles in the blog are the result of objective scientific research or articles written by senior journalists.

From the Ethics of the Fathers: "He [Rabbi Tarfon] used to say, it is not incumbent upon you to complete the task, but you are not exempt from undertaking it."

Thursday, April 28, 2016

The PA’s billion dollar fraud - Itamar Marcus and PMW staff

by Itamar Marcus and PMW staff

The PA’s claim that it no longer pays salaries to terrorist prisoners is false

Claiming
to have complied with demands of international donors, the PA announced
in August 2014 that it had stopped funding salaries to terrorist
prisoners, and that the PLO would fund those salaries instead

This
PMW report documents that the PA's claim to have stopped funding
terrorist prisoners' salaries is false. The PA Ministry of Finance
continues to make the decisions and allocate the money for salaries.

The
PA's pledge that it fulfilled donor countries' demands is false.
Therefore, the PA today is fraudulently receiving the $1 billion/year it
receives in foreign donor money

Overview:

2011:
PMW exposes that the PA pays high salaries to terrorist prisoners
jailed in Israel, among them murderers serving many life sentences.

2012-2014:
Western donor countries condemn these payments and threaten to cut off
funding unless the PA meets their demand and stop paying salaries to
imprisoned t!
errorists
.

August
2014: PA claims to acquiesce to international pressure, announces that
it has closed the PA Ministry of Prisoners' Affairs, and that salaries
to prisoners will no longer be paid by the PA but by a newly formed PLO
Commission of Prisoners' Affairs.

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bsp;

The
new PLO Commission is identical to the old PA Ministry of Prisoners'
Affairs in everything but name. The Commission and the salary payments
to prisoners remain under the "supervision" of the "Palestinian
presidency," i.e., Mahmoud Abbas. The PA Minister of Prisoners' Affairs
became the director of the PLO Commission of Prisoners' Affairs.

2014-2016:
Western donors accept PA assurances that the PA has stopped paying
salaries to terrorist prisoners and the PA continues to receive foreign
aid.

April
2016: This PMW report shows that the PA has misled donor countries and
in fact continues to fund salaries to terrorists. The PA today is
fraudulently receiving aid from Western donor countries of approximately
$1 billion/year.

-
The PA Ministry of Finance is identified by official PA sources as the
body responsible for paying salaries to terrorist prisoners.

- The PA Ministry of Finance continues to be responsible for policies regarding salaries to terrorists.

-
PA officials openly talk about the PA's continued payment of salaries
to prisoners based on current PA law that mandates that the PA pay them
salaries.

- When the PA was short on cash, it announced that it cut salaries to terrorist prisoners (and civil servants) by 60%.

-
In 2014, the last year the PA Ministry of Prisoners' Affairs operated,
its budget was 442 million shekels. The year after the "closure" of the
PA Ministry of Prisoners' Affairs, the PA raised the amount it transfers
to the PLO by 481 million shekels: from 294 million (2014), to 775 million (2015). The
additional 481 million shekels ($128 million) the PA gave to the PLO in
2015 is the amount the PLO Commission of Prisoners' Affairs needed to
take on the respon!
sibilitie
s of the PA Ministry of Prisoners' Affairs, which is primarily paying
terrorists salaries. The previous year's amount, 442 million shekels,
plus approximately 10% yearly rise matches the additional 481 million
shekels the PA gave the PLO in 2015.

- The source of the money for salaries to terrorist prisoners thus continues to be the PA.

Conclusion

- Western donors are being intentionally misled by the PA, which continues to fund the salaries to imprisoned terrorists.

-
By creating the PLO Commission of Prisoners' Affairs in order to hide
that it continues to fund salaries to terrorists, the PA has succeeded
to fraudulently receive $1 billion/year in foreign aid from the donor
countries.

Executive Summary

The
Palestinian Authority receives over a billion dollars in international
aid yearly. Several EU countries and the US threatened to stop funding
the PA after Palestinian Media Watch exposed in 2011 that the PA pays
high salaries to terrorist prisoners and released terrorists. Among the
terrorist prisoners on the PA payroll are murderers who are serving many
life sentences for killing Israeli civilians and orchestrating suicide
bombing attacks, such as Abdallah Barghouti who is serving 54 life
sentences for building bombs that murdered civilians in cafes, buses,
and at the Hebrew University.

To
counter the international condemnation and to continue receiving donor
funding, the PA anno!
unced in
August 2014 that it had closed the PA Ministry of Prisoners' Affairs
and established a new institution, the PLO Commission of Prisoners'
Affairs, which the PA claimed would instead fund the salaries from
non-PA sources.

However,
the PLO Commission of Prisoners' Affairs was new only in name. The PLO
Commission has the same responsibilities and pays the exact same amount
of salaries to prisoners. The payments are based on PA decisions and PA
law. The former PA Minister of Prisoners' Affairs, Iss!
a Karake,
became the director of the new PLO Commission and PA Chairman Mahmoud
Abbas retained overall supervision of the PLO Commission. (All sources
appear below.)

In
spite of these mere cosmetic changes, the international community
accepted the PA's assurances that the PA was no longer paying the
salaries to terrorist prisoners. One example is this statement issued by
the Dutch Government:

"The
responsibility for payments to prisoners was transferred to the PLO and
will no longer be charged to the budget of the PA, and these [payments
to prisoners] are not funded by PA tax revenues or donor funds. The PLO pays such costs from their own income, where the [Dutch] Cabinet has no access."

The
United States apparently also accepted that this change was enough.
When challenged by a member of Congress to cut funding to the PA because
of the salaries the PA paid to terrorists, Assistant US Secretary of
State Patterson, three months before the announced closing of the PA
ministry, explained !
that the
US was aware the PA would "phase that out" and therefore it was not
necessary to cut US funding to the PA:

"I frankly know that they're going to try and phase that out and we should give them an opportunity to do so."

[House Committee on Foreign Affair!
s' websit
e, April 29, 2014]

Palestinian
Media Watch has uncovered extensive and definitive evidence from
official PA sources, proving that the PA assurances to the Netherlands,
the US and other donors are false (all sources in full below):

-
In August 2014, the PA announced that salaries to prisoners would no
longer be paid by the PA but by the PLO. Yet, in October 2014, two
months later, the PA announced that there were more than 200,000
recipients of PA salaries, which "includes the families of the Martyrs (Shahids) and wounded, as well as the prisoners' and released [prisoners]."

-
In January 2015, five months later, the PA Ministry of Finance
announced that the PA budget for the Gaza Strip includes salaries to
prisoners from there who are in Israeli jails.

-
When Israel withheld PA tax money in early 2015, the PA announced that
prisoners receiving more than 2,000 shekels/month would only receive 60%
of their salary- the same reduction that was imposed the previous day
on all PA civil servants. W!
ere the P
LO paying prisoners' salaries from non-PA sources, Israel's holding up
tax money from the PA would have no impact prisoners' salaries. Clearly,
PA money is still the source paying terrorist prisoners' salaries.

-
In December 2015, an internal dispute started within the PA. The PA,
not the PLO, had decided to stop salary payments to a small number of
prisoners and released prisoners for various reasons. This is
significant because the PLO Commissioner of Prisoners' Affairs and PA
officials all criticized the PA Ministry of Finance for stopping the
salaries. No one complained to the PLO, as they should have, were it the
PLO that paid the salaries. Nearly !
a year an
d half after the PA claimed not be involved in salaries, the PA was
still deciding and allocating the money for the terrorist prisoners'
salaries. Significantly, the head of the PLO Commission of
Prisoners' Affairs, Issa Karake, personally complained to the PA
Ministry of Finance over the new PA policy regarding salaries to
prisoners. Why would he complain to the PA if he himself and the PLO
were in charge of the salaries?

-
When released prisoners were protesting against new conditions to
receive salary payments that had recently been imposed, they protested
in the offices of the PA Ministry of Finance and not in the offices of
the PLO Commission of Prisoners' Affairs.

-
Finally, PMW has uncovered PA Ministry of Finance documents that
indicate a money trail, showing the transfer of money from the PA to the
Palestinian National Fund (PNF), the body that funds the PLO, in the
amount needed to pay the salaries to terrorist prisoners:

A. In 2014, the budget of the PA Ministry of Prisoners' Affairs, which then paid the sa!
laries to
terrorist prisoners, was 442 million shekels.

B.
In 2015, after the Ministry of Prisoners' Affairs was closed, the PA
raised its annual transfer to the PLO via the Palestinian National Fund
by 481 million shekels ($128 million):

2014 transfer - 294 million shekels

2015 transfer - 775 million shekels

C.
The additional 481 million shekels the PLO received from the PA in 2015
was the amount it needed to fund the PLO Commission of Prisoners'
Affairs, undertaking the responsibilities of the Ministry of Prisoners'
Affairs. The transfer of 481 million is virtually identical to the
budget of the Ministry of Prisoners' Affairs in 2014 (442 million), plus
10% yearly growth due to rising prisoners salaries. According to PA
law, the salaries of terrorist prisoners rise the longer they are in
prison.)

D.
This route - money transfers from the PA to the PNF and then to the PLO
- is the way the PA is transferring money to the PLO in order to
continue funding salaries to terrorist prisoners, and to keep their
payments hidden from donor countries.

All
the above documentation shows that while the PA fraudulently claims to
donor countries that the PLO is paying salaries to terrorist prisoners
from non-PA sources, in fact the PA continues to be the source !
of the rewards to the terrorists.

Unaware
that the PA continues to fund salaries to terrorists, the donor
countries continue to contribute nearly one billion dollars a year to
the PA.